DadsFam Backups

DadsFam Backups keeps a safety net under your WordPress site. Back up your database and files whenever you like, or set a schedule and forget about it. When something goes wrong, restore in a few clicks.

It’s built for real-world hosting. Big sites usually choke other backup plugins because PHP runs out of time or memory halfway through. DadsFam Backups works in small, resumable steps instead — so a backup that’s too big to finish in one go simply picks up where it left off until it’s done.

What you get (free)

• Full backups — database + plugins, themes, uploads, and the rest of wp-content. Pick exactly what to include.
• Resumable engine — large sites back up in bounded chunks and never time out.
• One-click restore — restore the database, files, or both, right from the dashboard.
• “What will I lose?” before every restore — before you press the button, see in plain English what the restore removes: the orders, posts, pages, comments and customer accounts added since the backup was made, and any plugin, theme or WordPress versions it would change.
• Safety copy and one-click undo — just before a restore, the parts about to be replaced are backed up automatically. If the restore was not what you wanted, one click puts everything back as it was a moment before.
• Move or clone a site by link — create a transfer link on the old site and paste it on the new one: the backup is copied straight across, server to server, with no downloading, uploading or size limits. Click “Clone here” and the web address throughout your content and the database table prefix are adjusted for you.
• Look inside any backup — browse a backup folder by folder, download a single file, or put back just one file or folder instead of restoring everything. Only missing files are put back unless you choose to replace, and it can be undone for 24 hours.
• Switching from UpdraftPlus? — UpdraftPlus backups already on your site can be turned into DadsFam backups in one click, so your history comes with you. The UpdraftPlus files are not changed.
• Scheduled backups — daily, weekly or monthly at a time you choose. No server cron setup needed; it runs through WordPress and heals its own schedule.
• Smart retention — automatically keep only the most recent N backups. Pin the ones you want to keep for good, and give any backup a short note such as “Before the redesign”.
• Extra database backups — back up just the database daily in between weekly full backups, ideal for shops whose orders change all day.
• Exclusions — skip caches, node_modules, logs and anything else with simple patterns. Backups left behind by other backup plugins are spotted for you, so your archives do not fill up with old copies of other archives.
• Faster with photos and video — media that is already compressed is stored as it is instead of being squeezed again, which saves time on every backup.
• Email notifications — get told when a backup finishes or fails.
• Activity log — a clear history of every backup, restore and scheduled run.
• Secure storage — backups live in a protected folder (no public web access) and downloads are nonce + capability protected. A built-in test checks the folder really is private on your server, and tells you exactly what to send your host if it is not.
• Status where you already look — WordPress Site Health warns when a backup is overdue, an optional dot in the admin bar shows green, amber or red, and an optional weekly email says “All good” or exactly what needs attention.
• Off-site copies to Google Drive or OneDrive — connect an account in one click and every backup gets a second home. Uploads are resumable and continue in the background, so a big archive finishes even on a slow shared host.
• Restore from the cloud — lost the server, or deleted the local copy? Pick an off-site backup and it is pulled back onto your site, resuming by itself if the connection drops. Then restore it normally.

Built honestly

No nag screens, no crippled free version, no surprise server configuration. The free plugin really backs up and really restores your whole site.

Going further with Pro

An optional commercial add-on, DadsFam Backups Pro, adds more off-site destinations (Amazon S3 and S3-compatible, FTP/FTPS, SFTP), encrypted off-site copies, advanced schedules, a backup before every update with one-click undo, a Rescue Kit for when you cannot log in, and a long-term history of off-site backups. It is a separate plugin and is not required — Google Drive, OneDrive and cloud restore are all part of this plugin. Pro is at plugins.dadsfam.co.za.

A word about PRO

Right, let me be straight with you, because I hate being sold to as much as you do.

Everything above is free and it stays free. Backing your site up on a schedule, restoring it, cloning it to a new domain, downloading the archive, verifying every backup is not corrupt — none of those are premium features. Those are things a backup plugin should just do, and if I put them behind a paywall I would be taking the mickey.

There is a PRO add-on. It exists because I am a dad in Cape Town, and this is one of the things that puts food on the table at my house. That is the honest reason. Not “unlock your potential”, not “supercharge your workflow”. Just: if this plugin saved your site and you can spare it, PRO helps me keep building.

What PRO adds is for when your backups need to go further than Google Drive or OneDrive, which are free here — sending each one off to Amazon S3 or an FTP or SFTP box, encrypting those off-site copies, keeping a history of them out there, and running on a tighter schedule. It also keeps the old version before every update so a bad one can be undone in a click, and gives you a Rescue Kit for the day you cannot even log in. That is convenience and peace of mind. It is not the plugin working properly, because the plugin already works properly.

So if the free one does everything you need, brilliant. Genuinely. Use it, and I hope it saves you the afternoon nobody wants — the one where the site is gone and there is no backup. If you get to the point where off-site copies would let you sleep easier, PRO is at plugins.dadsfam.co.za.

Either way, thanks for using something I built. — Zak, DadsFam

PRO adds:

• Off-site backups to Amazon S3 and S3-compatible storage (Wasabi, Backblaze B2, DigitalOcean Spaces, MinIO)
• FTP, FTPS and SFTP destinations
• Encrypted off-site copies
• Remote retention — keep a set number of backups off-site, or a history: 7 daily, 4 weekly and 12 monthly
• More frequent, advanced backup schedules
• A copy of the old version before every plugin, theme and WordPress update, with “Undo last update”
• A Rescue Kit: a single file you upload when WordPress will not load, to restore a backup without logging in

External services

Connecting Google Drive or OneDrive is optional and nothing is sent anywhere until you connect an account.

When you do, this plugin uses the DadsFam connection service at https://connect.dadsfam.co.za to handle the sign-in. You are sent there to approve access, and it returns a one-time code that this site swaps for an access token server-to-server, so the token never travels through your browser. The service receives the provider you chose and the address to send you back to. Terms of use and privacy policy: dadsfam.co.za/privacy-policy and plugins.dadsfam.co.za/privacy-policy.

Once connected, your site talks directly to Google (googleapis.com) or Microsoft (graph.microsoft.com) to upload and download your backups. Nothing passes through DadsFam.

When you paste a transfer link under “Copy a backup from another site”, this site downloads that backup from the site address in the link — your other site. Nothing is sent anywhere else, and nothing happens until you paste a link.

The “Are my backups private?” test on the Settings tab (also run weekly by Site Health) requests a harmless test file from your own site’s address, to see whether the backups folder can be reached from the web. It contacts no other server.